You will not find many people who have spent seven years living as a monk in a desert monastery and then gone on to build a distinguished career across management consulting, banking, biotechnology, venture capital, and strategic leadership. But that is the path Kamal Sarma has walked.
After leaving the monastery as a teenager Kamal returned to Australia to complete his higher education and built a high-level career spanning two decades. He has held senior executive positions at McKinsey and Company, Eli Lilly Pharmaceuticals, St George Bank, and AMP Capital Investors. Kamal has firsthand experience with the pressure, complexity, and human dynamics that define life within organisations.
Following his corporate career Kamal co-founded two venture capital businesses in the IT and biotech sectors before establishing a strategic leadership firm. Over the past 20 years, Kamal and his team have worked with senior leaders and teams at organisations including Google, Facebook, the Reserve Bank of Australia, Bank of New York Mellon, PwC, Ernst and Young, Westpac, Commonwealth Bank, and ING Global, helping them build resilience, strengthen human connection, navigate change, and create high performance cultures.
Kamal is the author of three books, the international bestseller Mental Resilience: The Power of Clarity, featured in O The Oprah Magazine; The Leadership Leap, featured on Google Talks; and WinWin Conversations: The Art and Science of Human Connection. He holds a Bachelor of Economics with Honours from the University of Sydney and a Masters of Business Administration from the Australian Graduate School of Management. He is Chairman of the R U OK? Think Tank and Chairman of Amicus Digital.
What makes Kamal different is the integration of everything he brings. He has been that busy executive, he understands the mindset, the pressure, and the stakes from the inside. The result is a speaker and strategist who helps organisations not just perform better, but connect more deeply, with their people, their purpose, and each other, in a way that drives results that last.